Content

Technical analysis

Support

The support consists of a densely woven linen fabric with a simple plain weave. There are selvages at the top and bottom edges. There are no seams or additions.The canvas is stretched on a wooden frame with a cross-member. The stretcher is not original.

Structure of the paint layer

Hodler dispensed with a conventional groundlayer and painted directly onto the canvas. He began by locating ‘Truth’ at the exact centre of the picture, then transferred her contours to the canvas using a variety of aids.

The paint was applied partly with a palette knife and partly with a brush. The brushstrokes, splashes of paint and areas where the underlying canvas shows through indicate that he worked quickly.

He accentuated the figures using black, red or blue contour lines. Later corrections carried out by Hodler using Raffaëlli sticks in a pink tone can be seen directly beside Truth and also over older paintlosses in the background.